


Honesty

by Emjen_Enla



Series: Prompted Works [8]
Category: The Folk of the Air - Holly Black
Genre: Cardan Greenbriar tells no lies, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, F/M, Late Night Conversations, Speculation-Book 3: The Queen of Nothing, Though of course he never can
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-16 03:47:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19309990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emjen_Enla/pseuds/Emjen_Enla
Summary: Jude and Cardan late at night. Written for the prompts "“It’s late.  Shouldn’t you be asleep?” and “I’ve always been honest with you” on Tumblr.





	Honesty

**Author's Note:**

> I decided to challenge myself and do them both in one fic. This is technically a continuation of the last Jurdan ask, but it should stand alone as well.
> 
> If you want to request something, my Tumblr url is @emjenenla.

The apartment was lit faintly with moonlight. Jude padded down the hall, her feet silent on the carpeting thanks to years of training. She wasn’t exactly sure what she was going to do, but if she remained in her bedroom staring at the ceiling for one more moment she would lose her mind.

She paused in the kitchen, looking through the door into the living room. The back of a black-haired head was visible over the back of the couch. She took a silent step forwards, wondering if he was awake.

“Are you going to sneak up behind me and kill me?” Cardan asked. Jude jumped and cursed herself for the response.

“How did you know I was here?” she asked stepping into the living room.

Cardan turned to look over his shoulder at her. “You are not the only one with access to the Roach’s spy training,” he said. “Also, I can see your reflection in that.” He jerked his head at the TV, obviously trying to hide the fact that he didn’t know what it was called.

“It’s late,” he continued, not waiting for her response. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?”

“I was contemplating if I could sneak out here and murder the High King of Elfhame without my sister waking up,” Jude said. She was almost entirely joking--much to her chagrin--but she hoped Cardan took her seriously anyway.

Cardan raised an eyebrow. “And yet you didn’t even bring a kitchen knife with which to bring about my grisly end,” he said, deadpan. “It appears your skills in wanton murder have withered since you ended my brother.” His tone grew sharp when he mentioned Balekin. Whatever his reasons for this visit were, he was definitely still angry.

“Why are you still awake?” she shot back, finally stepping around the side of the couch so she could see more than just his head. He was sitting cross-legged on the couch, the blankets Vivi had pulled out of the closet cocooned around himself. “Pizza upset your stomach?” she asked. She hoped that it had. Cardan was quite possibly the pickiest person alive. She’d expected him to hate pizza, but it turned out he’d loved it, though he’d picked all the pepperoni off his slices before eating them. She wasn’t sure why the idea of him enjoying such a human food made her want to punch something, but it did.

“No, I feel fine,” Cardan said. “I am, however, understandably worried about being murdered by my wife while I sleep. Not to mention, I am nocturnal, and even if I wasn’t-” he broke off, seeming to contemplate what he was about to say. After a moment he soldiered on, “Even if I wasn’t, I have difficulty sleeping when sober.” His tone of voice was startling. Normally when Cardan admitted things about himself, he did it flippantly like he wanted you not to notice, but this time he spoke in a dead serious tone.

“Really?” she asked, mostly just to say something. She tried not to let this new information affect her view of him and his behavior.

“I’ve always been honest with you,” Cardan said.

“We both know that the gulf between being honest about some things and being honest about everything is much wider than most humans realize,” Jude said. “Do not treat me as if I am one of them.”

“Very well,” Cardan said with a sigh. “At the very least, I was not stretching the truth with any of what I just said about why I am awake.” He thought for another moment then went on, “I also was not stretching the truth in any of the promises I made to you the night my brother died.”

Jude pressed her lips together. This was something she had already known. She’d thought over everything Cardan had said that night hundreds of times and had never found a loophole. She knew Cardan had been speaking the truth, but that just made everything worse.

“Why are you actually here?” she asked.

Cardan frowned as he thought. “I am not sure, exactly,” he said after a while. “I suppose I came because I missed you.”

“If you missed me so much,” Jude snapped before something happened to make her admit that she’d missed him too, “why not lift my banishment and let me come home?” Too late she caught the slip of tongue which referred to Faerie as “home.” She’d just handed him a weapon on a silver platter.

Cardan huffed out a laugh and she assumed he must have caught her slip and be preparing to use it against her, but that was not what he said. What he said was, “Jude, darling, are you so certain I’m the only one who can lift your banishment?”


End file.
